Helping schools to become health-promoting environments - an evaluation ofthe Wessex Healthy Schools Award

The concept of the health-promoting school embodies a holistic, whole schoo l approach to personal and community health promotion. Healthy school award schemes, which are increasing, are seen as one way of helping schools to b ecome health promoting. Many are based on the Wessex Healthy Schools Award scheme (WHSA) which was established in 1993. This paper outlines a 3-year e valuation study of the effectiveness of the WHSA intervention in changing h ealth promotion policy and practice in school, and in influencing health-re lated knowledge, attitudes and behaviour pupils. The study design was quasi -experimental, and was conducted in II intervention secondary and five cont rol schools. It involved pupils, teachers support staff parents, school gov ernors, health promotion officers and education advisers, using a range of quantitative and qualitative tools. The Award process, which is linked to n ine kev areas of health, lasted 15 months. Changes in school health promoti on were assessed by audit; pupils' health-related knowledge, attitudes and behaviour through self-administered questionnaires; and attitudes and perce ptions of staff parents and governors from semi-structured interviews. The results showed that audit scores for all areas, except physical activity an d taking responsibility for health, increased in intervention schools, indi cating positive Award-related changes There was little improvement in healt hy food choices, smoke-free environment and developing community links. Pup ils' knowledge high at the baseline, remained unchanged. Positive effects o n smoking uptake and drug use were seen, but little change in healthy eatin g and physical activity Older girls made greater progress in all areas. Par ents and non-teaching staff strongly supported school health promotion, per ceived many benefits of the Award, and wished to be more actively involved. The Award positively influenced the development of a health-promoting scho ol, perceived as an important component of education. Further research is n eeded into ways of improving pupils' diet and activity levels, how schools can implement a smoke-free environment, the development of community links, and ways in which a whole school approach can be achieved.